A Nightmare In Shibuya
by Foreign Nebula
Summary: If witnessing the brutal murder of her best friend through one of her 'dreams' was bad enough, a shadowy figure is now stalking Mai's dreams. Does a mysterious picture from her childhood hold the key? It's a battle against the clock to figure out who is killing off her friends... Before she's next victim.
1. Prologue

Disclaimer: Do. Not. Own. Neither Ghost Hunt, nor the premise for_ Nightmare on Elmstreet. _Please don't sue.

_**A Nightmare In Shibuya**_

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"_Chihiro!" _Mai gasped as tears blurred her vision. She sat bolt up-right on the couch, startling the occupants of the room. Without a second thought to the people who were staring at her wide-eyed, she had sprung from the couch and slammed open the front door to the office that she wouldn't have been surprised if the glass shattered. But that wasn't important now.

Vaguely she heard her name being called out by several people behind her, but she ignored them as the blood roared in her ears. Her feet thundered down the near empty streets, dodging traffic and pedestrians as they hurried back to their homes for the night. She disregarded the annoyed shouts as she cut off people in the crowds and weaved her way recklessly through sea of vehicles on the roads. Her mind was focused solely on the image of her childhood friend and –

'_NO!'_ she screamed in her mind, and dove through a group of teenagers as they took up the sidewalk. They yelled profanity at her back, but she didn't hear them, her breath burning her lungs distracting her from her wild behaviour. She refused to think about the images that she had seen in her dream, the sheer amount of blood and the cruel laughter that had echoed behind her...

The pain that had once radiated from her chest, was now merely phantom throb that beat in time with her rapidly pulsing heart.

Fear and dread clawed at her very soul as her slippered feet pounded the unforgiving pavement. The apprehension and sheer terror that she felt were fuelled by the remnants of the dream. She honestly didn't know if what she had seen was actually happening (_Dear God, please don't let it be real! _she pleaded in her mind), or it was all just a horrifying dream caused by being over-worked and stressed out, with little to no sleep in the last week. She knew that Naru would be beyond pissed off for taking off like she did, but she had to be _sure_ that what she had seem was just a dream. _God, let it be a nightmare_.

Something, though, was telling her that it was the former and she felt her heart break a little.

Anxiety coursed through her veins as she finally entered the residential side of the city, and it was then that she heard the sirens as they pierced through the fog that lay heavily in her mind. Stumbling to a halt, she breathed hard, eyes darting about as her sweat turned cold and the anxiety turned to sick apprehension. Nausea churned in her stomach and she shot off like a rocket, pushing herself harder, barrelling recklessly down the suburban alleyways. She quickly approached the source of the commotion.

Time seemed to suddenly slow down around her as she rounded the final corner to her original destination. Sound was abruptly snatched away, leaving her ears ringing with the echoes of her harsh gasps for breath and the surge of blood pounding away in her veins.

A large crowd of people blocked her way, but she was beyond the point of caring for etiquette. She elbowed her way violently through the front of the crowd and then some, slipping passed the police officers who were making a human barricade to keep the nosey neighbours out. Bile rose in her throat as she stared at the house in front of her.

It was a typical suburban Japanese styled house; a high white-wash fence left only the second floor visible to the people on the street. She knew that the walls were panelled in a cheery canary yellow colour, but as the orange streetlamps shone on the walls, they now looked sickly and gave off a foreboding aura. There were dark green shutters on each window that protected the glass from seasonal storms, but they now stood as silent sentinels to the dark voids that Mai knew were once cheery and familiar rooms behind them.

She stood in front of two police cars and an ambulance that were somehow crammed into the small lane. Her heart thundered in her throat. She knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that there would be no need for the ambulance, but she vehemently denied that fact as her eyes swiftly spotted several figures as they streamed out of the gate in front of her.

Two police officers were having a difficult time trying to subdue a young man as they exited the house. He was shirtless and covered in gore, dark eyes wild with terror and shock. He tried to buck his body out of the officers firm grip, screaming words that Mai couldn't hear, yet understood perfectly.

'_I didn't do it! Something murdered her! IT WASN'T ME!'_

The world around Mai started to spin violently at the man's words, her body as confusing as her emotions. Thoughts escaped her grasp and she knew that she was teetering on the brink of oblivion. Her eyes locked onto the next two people to emerge from the gate, wheeling with them a gurney that she had only ever seen in horror movies.

The two grim-faced paramedics lifted the gurney above the door frame of the gate, so as not to jar the body that lay beneath the bloody sheet. But as they set it down on her side of the lane, a pale hand slithered from underneath the confines of the white sheet that had been stained a red so deep it was almost black in the streetlamps.

Brown eyes focused on the hand, ignorant of the police officers behind her who had finally noticed her standing beyond the crowd.

On the middle finger of the pale, dead hand, was a thin silver ring. Mai didn't have to take a closer look to know that there was writing on the outside of the ring. She didn't need to examine the piece of jewellery to know that it was a cheap trinket, but held so much meaning to the girl.

To both of them.

She couldn't deny the facts any longer, and with that acknowledgement, regular sound exploded in her ears – the police officers shouting at her, the gore-covered man yelling his innocent claims, the noise of hysterical sobbing – and at that same instant, time seemed to return to normal.

With a start, she realised that the hysterical sobbing was coming from her and before she could stop it, a keening wail was ripped from her throat as she threw herself at the gurney, only to be restrained by the police officers until the ambulance was quickly loaded up and disappeared down the road.

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"Where the _HELL _have you been?"

Mai shut the door slowly and rested her forehead against the cool glass. She could hear them all screaming at her, but she couldn't pay any attention to them. She felt numb, a cold having settled heavily in her stomach. Tears still left salty trails down her eyes, but she made no move to wipe them away.

She slowly turned around and moved with an agonising slowness into the main room where she was bombarded with angry faces and worried looks.

"- running around the damn city for _three_ hours looking for you!" Monk yelled harshly, too far gone in his justified rage to notice the state that she was in. Beside him stood Ayako, fury clouding her eyes and making a vein pulse at her temple as they competed against one-another to be heard.

"- and not to mention my missed hair appointment. _And_," Ayako growled, blinking in confusion when Mai turned away from them and shuffled off to the kitchenette. "Get _back_ here and apologise _right now!_" she screamed, stomping after the younger woman.

Monk stared after them, a sense of dread settling into his stomach.

The front door slammed open, and Lin, Naru and Yasuharu burst in, anger clearly evident in their eyes. "Where is she?" Naru growled, not even bothering to take his shoes off as he stormed into the main room, blue eyes hard chips of ice.

Monk was about to tell him where the girl had retreated to, when the sound of shattering ceramic resounded from the small kitchenette. Four pairs of feet ate up the small space to get to the small room, four set of different coloured eyes widening and anger being forgotten at the sight that greeted them.

Mai was standing in front of the sink, her usual warm brown eyes a hollow hazel that was devoid of any and all emotion. Tears ran unchecked down her cheeks, landing on the cracked pieces of what was once her favourite tea mug. Ayako stood to the side, a lost look on her face as she stared at first Mai, then to the men crowding the entryway. The shrine-maiden took a hesitant step forwards, a hand outstretched, when Mai gave a sudden sob.

The noise that had escaped her throat sounded wretched and filled with unspeakable sorrow. The young woman took a shuddering breath, only to choke on another sob. Before anyone had realised it, she had collapsed onto the floor, heedless of the sharp little cuts that she was getting from the tiny shards of the shattered mug on her long, exposed legs.

"Mai!" Ayako, and several other voices exclaimed, rushing to her side as the woman seemed to splinter at the seams.

Ayako gathered Mai into her arms, her face pale with worry and fear. She had no idea what had caused Mai's sudden departure earlier in the evening, but she knew that it had something to do with how the young woman seemed to be falling apart in her arms. "Mai, what happened?" she whispered, rocking the hysterical girl in her hold.

The question seemed to make it worse. Before she had been quiet, albeit sobbing noisily, now there were words tumbling out from her mouth that made no sense. "_Ohgodohgodohgodohgod!_" she moaned, "_She's gone! It's all my fault! My fault!_" she keened, hugging herself. She thrashed her head from side to side, viciously trying to shake the images that she had seen out from her head.

"Do something!" Yasuhara yelled above Mai's screaming, his once-cool face, crumbling into one of anxiousness. He had never seen Mai in such a condition, not even when she had awoken from that dream during the Urado case several years previously. This was much more than that, something much more prolific than a simple dream.

Lin disappeared into his office and retrieved a fleecy red blanket. He bent down next to Ayako and quickly wrapped the fabric around Mai who continued to thrash and cry out, her eyes staring at something unseeingly. _"Noooooo!"_ she wailed, struggling against Lin and Ayako.

"Damnit," Ayako cursed, having a hard time holding onto the petite girl, "Monk, I've got my kit in the car!" she yelped when Mai's head connected with her chin. She went cross-eyed for several seconds before grounding out another curse.

Monk, meanwhile, nodded and was off like a flash, leaving Naru and Yasuhara standing in the entryway of the kitchen.

Stoically, as if the scene he was watching didn't disturb him in the slightest, Naru took a step forward and knelt down next to Lin. He narrowed his eyes and reached out with both hands, grasping the sides of her face and holding her still.

"Mai," he said, loud enough to gain her attention slightly, "calm down." He ordered, watching as her eyes dilated faintly. Her struggling slowed down, her keening wails of anguish (for that was what it was; he knew those sounds very well, as did everyone on the team) quieted down until she was giving loud hiccupping sobs. Her tears were still overflowing from red, puffy eyes, but she still wasn't herself, her grief still too raw to be subdued. "Good," he muttered, feeling his heart constrict at the sight of the woman before him.

Mai looked pitiable, a contorted caricature of the woman that he desperately wanted gone. He knew the second that he had stepped foot into the kitchenette and saw her, that she was most definitely not possessed by a rogue spirit. This was all the doing of the event that had passed in the last few hours, and he wanted answers...

But he knew that he wouldn't get them any time soon.

He turned to Lin as the man stood up. "Mai will not be left alone tonight. Set up the spare room and I'll be with you shortly. Yasuhara, go with him. Once your done, you can go home." He stated to Lin and the younger man, watching in mild satisfaction as his long-time friend obeyed and hurried out of the office. Yasuhara nodded stiffly, looking slightly green, before following after Lin.

Naru turned to Ayako and shuffled forwards, reaching for Mai and easily picking up the petite woman. He stood up, glancing down at her tear-streaked face for several second, before moving out into the sitting area. Ayako followed behind him, a frown marring her pale face. She said nothing as she watched Naru sit down on the couch with Mai curled up in his lap, knowing that now was most definitely not the time for inappropriate comments.

The girl was almost swallowed by the blanket, her head the only thing visible, and even then, it was buried in Naru's dark shirt. It didn't seem to bother their narcissistic boss, but the frown that lined his handsome features most certainly was a new development.

For the third time that night (or early morning, but Ayako couldn't be bothered with semantics right then and there) and Monk ran through the door, carrying a black leather bag that had seen better days. He took one look at Mai and walked quickly to Ayako, handing her the bag and going to kneel on the floor next to Mai and Naru. He said nothing, but watched as the resident doctor opened the bag and sorted through the contents, before pulling out a new syringe and a small vial of clear liquid.

Ayako was quiet as she worked, sliding the needle into the vial and withdrawing a certain amount of the fluid before taking the needle out and placing the glass back into the bag. She turned and moved over to Naru and Mai, indicating to Monk to move with her free hand. "I'm going to give you a mild sedative to help you sleep, is that okay Mai?" she asked, already pulling on the blanket to reveal a shoulder covered by Mai's dark blue tee-shirt. Getting no response from the girl, Ayako rolled up the sleeve and quickly jabbed the girl with the needle, injecting her with a dose of sedative that would give the girl a deep and dreamless sleep.

No doubt that what Mai had seen would forever haunt the girl, and the little relief she could get from a dreamless slumber would be greatly appreciated.

A minute or so later, Naru saw Mai out cold in his arms. He looked to the two who hovered over him, nodding his head slightly. No words were needed to be exchanged between the three remaining ghost hunters. Ayako quickly gathered her things and left with Monk following closely behind her.

Before shutting the door completely behind him, Monk turned back around and looked to Mai as she slept fitfully in Naru's arms. "Call us, if anything happens." He said, and saw his boss nodded resolutely. He gave a small, sad sigh and shut the door completely.

Naru closed his eyes when he was finally alone and gave a sharp sigh. He opened them again and glanced down at Mai's sleeping face, worry clearly evident in his gaze. He untangled one hand from under her knees and reached for a strand of hair that had gotten loose. He twirled his finger around it before tucking it behind her ear.

Even in her sleep, Mai cried, a frown creasing the area between her eyebrows. "What happened to you Mai?" Naru asked quietly, watching as a quiet sob parted her lips. "What did you see?"

But by the time that he would find out, it would be already too late.

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_Mai frowned as she found herself floating in darkness. It was absolute and unrelenting, but she felt warm and safe. She knew that nothing could get her here; in this space she was secure and protected. _

_She was tired, her body achy and fatigued, and she smiled. Nothing could get her here; she had nothing to worry about, she had no pain._

_Curling up into a ball, she started to slip off into a dream, when the sound of laughter rang around her. She was too far gone to feel fear, but she did feel the hair on her arms and the back of her neck stand on end._

"_One, two, Akumu's coming for you," she mumbled under breath and succumbed to a dreamless slumber._

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I'm not 100-per-cent sure I wanna continue this or leave it as a mysterious one-shot. Your thoughts matter! Review and I might continue!


	2. Chapter 1

**A Nightmare In Shibuya**

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_**Disclaimer: I don't own so please don't sue. I own the relative plot, but it's mainly taken from **_**A Nightmare on Elm Street. _Enjoy!_**

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**Chapter 1: Funeral**

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Staring down at the closed casket, Taniyama Mai couldn't help but feel numb. It wasn't the first time – nor the last (she felt) – that she had been to a funeral. She had buried her grandparents when she was young with her mother and father flanking both of her sides, explaining the intricacies of death as best as they possibly could to an emotional five-year-old. Then not eight months after the fact, she was burying her father with her mother heartbrokenly watching beside her. And then lastly, her own mother.

For each death, Mai had been prepared; her grandparents were old and destined to leave; her father was a police officer who routinely risked his life for the greater good; her mother was diagnosed with breast cancer at the age of thirty-nine.

But _this_? This was altogether new and terrifying and shocking. It had been a jolt to the system, made fact by her midnight run to ensure that her dreams were just that: _dreams_, when in reality, it had been a _nightmare_. Still she begged herself that it was all just a cruel joke and that Chihiro would flounce through the lecture theatre doors of their university and yell out '_surprise!'_ – only a small part of Mai knew (berated her actually) that she was being childish if she thought that her friend was still alive.

There would be no more pranks and late-night deep and meaningful conversations over the phone. No more giggling over boys (even if they were twenty-one years old), no more study dates with other members of their group.

No, this had been as sudden as the realisation of her rapidly awakening powers. One second Mai had been talking with Monk, and then the next she had been dreaming about the brutal murder of her best friend.

The Shinto priest continued on with his prayers, but the words made no difference to Mai. The shock had yet to truly wear off, but the numbness was slowly warming into a sharp ache in her breast. Tears pricked her eyes and before she realised it, a chocked sob escaped her mouth before she could stop it and she found herself crumbling to the ground in the back row of mourners. Warm arms wrapped themselves around her shoulders and she was lifted once again to her feet, then pressed into a hard chest to cry.

Time dragged on as she cried, and suddenly the service was over. People murmured soothing words of condolences to grieving friends, their speech quiet, almost as if they spoke too loud that they would wake the dead. They all hurried to their parked cars, leaving only a small group of mourners behind.

Mai sniffled, eyes red and puffy. She sighed, pulling away from Ayako and swallowing heavily. "I'll be okay." She whispered, nodding her head more to herself than to her worried work-mates. She turned on her heel and walked up quickly to Chihiro's aunt, a woman who was plainly in shock and disbelief.

Midoriko Ayumi was in her late forties and had been the younger sister to Chihiro's mother. When Chihiro's parents died in a horrible car crash as a child, Ayumi had taken her niece in and looked after her. It had been the two of them for many years, until Chihiro had met Mai through a counselling group catering specifically for young orphans. After that, the two teenage girls had been nearly inseparable. Dark hair flecked with grey, Ayumi had been like a surrogate aunt to Mai, herself, after she had learned of Mai's own past.

"Ayumi," Mai whispered, all but sweeping into the woman's arms and holding her tight. She could feel the tears start in the back of her eyes once more, feel the horrific remnants of the dream-vision that she had had on the night of Chihiro's murder. Fear curled into her stomach at the thought, her blood growing cold, but she ignored it in favour of giving at least some semblance of comfort to the older woman.

"I can't believe she's gone." Ayumi whimpered, dark eyes red-rimmed from the countless hours of tears that she had shed. Her little Chihiro had been snatched away from her, just like her older sister had been years before. It was true that she had healed after she had taken in her niece, but with Chihiro's own death, it had torn open the wound like a scab on a still-healing wound. She clutched onto Mai like a life-line, knowing deep in her heart, that the young woman was going through the same Hell that she was going through. They had both lost someone important to them, someone who had helped them to heal and become better people, someone who would never grace them again with her presence in this lifetime.

Mai clutched onto Ayumi tighter, biting her lip to keep the gut-wrenching sobs at bay. Pain ebbed in her body from her heart-break, her mind flashing back to the losses that she had already faced in her short life. First her grandparents in a fatal car accident, and then her father being shot in the line of duty. But it had been her mother that had been the hardest to bare, watching as she had wasted away before her very eyes, only to remain the shell of a person she had once been. Gone had been the woman who had woken up with a smile on her face and hot pancakes every morning for breakfast, and instead, the illness had stolen those traits and left a vegetable lying in a sterile hospital bed and an empty stomach.

In the years to follow her mother's deterioration and eventual death, Mai had learnt to fend for herself. She had no family that she knew of to take her in, no one had been close to her parents to even want to adopt her or become her guardian, so she had taken what little monetary assets she had been given to her by the government for her father's work, sold her family home, and moved into the same apartment block as one of her teachers, hoping against hope that she wouldn't be picked up by the government. By some luck (which she would later find out was because of her teacher), children's services failed to pick up on her and she lived her life in relative peace, shopping frugally and cashing in her weekly cheques sent to her by the police department as the only living relative of a deceased officer.

That was until she had met Naru and the others. As some people would say, the rest was history.

One thing that she hadn't count on, though, was the emergence of her psychic abilities. Granted, she remembered stories of her grandparents having some kinds of abilities, like being able to sense spirits, but had never really paid that much attention to it until recently. When she had been free from studies or from work, she had tried to research her grandparents thoroughly, but she didn't have the know-how or knack to find information like Yasuhara did. She had all but given up hope on find out more about her grandparents by herself and had been about to approach Yasuhara about helping her when she had dreamt of Chihiro's murder.

Swallowing thickly, Mai clenched her arms tighter around the sobbing woman once more, before letting go and stepping back, wiping at her own red eyes with her tear-drenched handkerchief that Lin had been thoughtful enough to give her.

No words could be exchanged between the two women, each feeling the others pain for what it was: a loss that would be forever in their hearts and torture their minds until the murderer had been caught and brought to justice. They both knew that Chihiro's fiancé hadn't killed her, would never had even thought of harming one hair on the woman's head, let alone attack her so brutally.

Ayumi nodded sadly once at her before turning away and staring at the lowered casket. She closed her eyes in painful contemplation before seeming to jolt, causing Mai to lean towards the older woman in case she fell over or was having a heart-attack brought on by the stress and pain of loss.

"Are you alright?" Mai asked, stepping unevenly in the dewy grass in her borrowed black heels from Ayako. She put a hand on her shoulder to steady the woman as she whipped around to face her, a small smile coming to the woman's pale face.

Mai watched as Ayumi reached into the pocket of her black pencil skirt and pulled out an old, yellowed photograph. There was writing on the back of it, badly smudged in what looked to be children's scrawl, but Mai could vaguely make out Chihiro's name. Ayumi stared down at the photo with an almost melancholic smile, her eyes distant. "I was looking through some of Chihiro's things before I stumbled over this." She started, a fresh wave of tears sliding down her cheeks, "I don't even think that she remembered this, but I think that she would want you to have it." She finished, handing over the photo and giving a soft sob.

Curious, Mai read the back, her eyebrows scrunching together in confusion. Written in black crayon, were the toddler written names of one Sato Chihiro, and Taniyama Mai, age, four-years-old. Dread seemed to curdle in her stomach then, the puzzlement quickly turning into a bone-jarring anxiety that left a cold sweat to break out over her skin.

Looking back up quickly to Ayumi, Mai licked her suddenly dry lips and slowly flipped the photograph over, her stomach seeming to bottom out from her body. Her hands trembled in shock as a new pain replaced the one in her heart, one that she knew all-too well. She was very intimate with the emotion known as Fear, had felt it in varying stages and degrees throughout her life, but with the presentation of this photo in her hands, it left a cold terror to numb her mind and body, the blood draining from her face.

A preschool class photo lay in her hands with the edges rumpled and worn, the whites turning yellow with age. Thirteen smiling children looked out at her from the photo, all dressed in their best dresses and outfits, standing as still as young children could for as long as they could. The one thing that Mai noticed about the children were their smiles; they seemed forced and as she studied their eyes properly, she was startled to realise that in almost all of the children, there was a twinkle of fear in them. Trepidation tightened her chest as she scanned all the faces of the children, spotting almost immediately the child that had once been her best friend, Chihiro.

Toddler Chihiro stood in the back line of the class, wearing a pastel pink dress, embroidered with purple butterflies. In typical little girl fashion, her long black hair had been pulled into pig-tails on the sides of her head, decorated with ribbons the same shade of pink as her dress. Her face was rounded with baby fat, a glowing rose in the apple of her cheeks that she never seemed to have really grow out of. What made her different from the other children in the photo were her green eyes, a trait that she had inherited from her Irish father, but even in the photo, they sparkled in fear at something that Mai couldn't see.

And it was there, tucked away in the very middle between two chubby boys that she saw something that made the hair on the back of her neck stand on end. Her mouth ran dry as her fingers started to visibly shake, and her ability to breath was being hindered by the almost feral fear that had gripped her chest. For there, in the photo, was none other than _herself_ as a child; short and skinny as a bean-pole, with light brown hair in two separate plaits and wide brown eyes that seemed to hold a frightening secret that she, even as an adult, didn't want to ever find out about.

Hands were shaking her shoulder roughly, making her snap out of the dark spiral her mind had been descending into, and she turned her head, finding that her lungs were burning for air.

Monk and Ayako looked at her with worry clear in their eyes, their chests heaving from the effort it took to run the fair distance (she now realised) from where the cars had been parked, to where she had been standing.

Blinking in shock, she stared at the two before realising that she had wondered off in a daze and away from the last of Chihiro's mourners. Her body still trembled from the shock of seeing her young self, but what startled her more (which bordered on panic) was the fact that Chihiro had been in possession of the photograph in the first place.

"What happened?" Monk asked breathlessly, watching her with worry filled eyes.

Without thinking about it, Mai handed over the photo and watched as the two stared at it, frowning their confusion. Monk was the first to look up before looking back down and scowling at the photograph down in his hands. "What about it? It's just a photo." He said, yelping slightly when Ayako plucked the picture from his hands and flipped it over.

Ayako frowned, for once not caring if the action would cause wrinkles or not. "I don't get it either? You knew Chihiro as a child, so what?" she said, handing the photo back to Mai.

It seemed as if her tongue was glued to the roof of her mouth as she took the old print back from the older woman. She held it gingerly in her hands, almost as if it would give her the plague, but with the level of unadulterated _terror_ that zinged through her systems at the mere thought of the photo, she wouldn't have been the least bit surprised if it came alive and ate her. She knew it wasn't the photo, itself, that induced the panic (logically speaking, she _knew_ she had nothing to fear) but it was the reality of the situation that the photograph had present that was horrifying the living daylights out of her.

From the corner of her eyes, she saw Naru and Lin approach with neutral faces, although the latter did have a twinkle of worry in his eyes.

Working her tongue free, she swallowed a few times before breathing in past the fear that had seemed to take root in her soul. She took one last look at the photograph before violently jamming it into the pocket of her black coat (borrowed yet _again_ from Ayako) and flexing her still shaking fingers. By this time, Naru and Lin had arrived and were giving the three of them strange looks.

"Is there a problem here?" Naru asked in a no-nonsense kind of voice, waiting for someone to answer. He looked from Mai's pale, tear-streaked face, to both Ayako's and Monk's twin expressions of confusion. Which was directed at Mai. He turned to face her, waiting for her to answer.

Shaking her head, Mai licked her lips nervously, her fingers dancing apprehensively over the pocket that held the photo. "The problem, Naru, is why my murdered best friend has a photo of the two of us as children, when I have only ever met her for the first time _three years ago_."

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**TBC...**

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**A/N: **I just want to say a MASSIVE sorry for the lack of updates on this fic. I just want to let everyone know how much I totally appreciate the feedback I've gotten for this and I love you all. REVIEWS feed the muse so don't forget to leave one. Just press the little button at the bottom of the page, yes? Good.


	3. Chapter 2

_**Ghost Hunt: A Nightmare In Shibuya**_

**Disclaimer: **Once again, I don't own Ghost Hunt nor A Nightmare On Elm Street. I own the plot, somewhat *Shrugs*

This chapter is rated _**M**_, for _blood, gore and horror_. But this shouldn't really disturb you because, well, you _are_ reading a Ghost Hunt fic. Also, please excuse grammatical errors, this has been semi-betaed by my sister **Shadow of Malice. **Once you're done reading this, maybe you can all go check out her Ghost Hunt fic, **_Cases of a Different Kind_**. Be kind and drop her a review. On another note, disreguard the spelling of certain words, I'm Australian, and by saying so, I've been tuaght to spell in British English, not American English, ie: colour (EN) vs. color (USA).

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**Chapter 2: Nightmare**

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She was standing in front of a set of glass-less doors, sharp shards littering the asphalt at her bare feet. The painted wood had not survived the years, flaking and peeling away to reveal the rotting timber. In certain places, black smudges revealed where there had been a fire, destroying what little time had not erased. Weeds poked through the cracks in the pavement leading up to the entrance, further enhancing the decrepit state of what Mai could see was once a homely building.

She turned her head slightly, taking in the overgrown front yard and rusted gate, spying several discarded toys amongst the sea of grass that seemed to be forever frozen in time. A chill breeze blew suddenly, causing her hair to dance in her eyes and a shiver to work its way down her spine.

Ash danced in the breeze, bringing with it the scent of death and decay.

Somewhere in the distance, behind and beyond the rusted gate, she heard a dog give a mournful howl to the thin sliver of moon hanging high above her head. No other light shone down other than that of the moon, bathing everything that she saw in an eerie silver-blue. Truth be told, it just made everything more creepy than what she was comfortable with.

Movement beyond the doors jolted Mai from her stupor. Her sixth sense flared to life suddenly, urging her to turn tail and run in the opposite direction. A frown settled on her face then. She knew that she was having one of _those_ dreams, and every time she did, her sense had told her that although what she would see would most probably scar her for life, that nothing would ever harm her. But this time was different.

The same emotions she had felt when on her mad dash through Shibuya to Chihiro's house, flashed through her body, making her palms sweat and her breath to catch in her lungs. Dread, fear, anxiety, _terror_; they were just some of the sensations that were working through her body, and none of them felt very good.

Biting her lip, she swallowed and ignored her Sense, picking her way gingerly through the broken glass. She winced once or twice when she miss-stepped and trod on a sharp piece of window, silently wondering as to how she was able to feel the pain of her skin being sliced open. She shook her head of the thought, slipping between the missing windowpane of the door and entering what looked to be a lobby.

She took a deep breath, her heart jack-hammering in her chest as she squinted into the gloom. Taking an uncertain step forwards, she gasped in shock, staggering backwards into the wall that had replaced the doors she had walked through.

Colour and light and sound exploded around her. Dark walls grew brighter until they were painted with the buttery yellow colour of happiness. Once broken furniture seemed to repair itself, almost as if someone had hit the rewind button on a remote and hit pause when the couches and coffee tables looked good as new. Within seconds, the lobby had been thrown back in time to a place where it had only seen glory days and nothing of its apparent future.

Children's laughter floated down from one of the corridors to her left, the sound pleasant and happy to her ears. Mai couldn't help but smile slightly, a warmth blossoming in her chest as the children started a song. Gone was the fear that she had felt when she had first stepped foot inside, although her Sense was still telling her to run.

She could only vaguely remember the song that was being sung, the tune almost hauntingly familiar and yet foreign enough for her to not know the words; or not remember them. She tilted her head to try and catch even the smallest whisper being sung, but it was as if the children were singing in an entirely different language.

The pitter-patter of feet had Mai snapping her head in the direction of the other corridor, this one leading in the opposite direction of the children. She just caught sight of a little girl with long pigtails dashing around the corner and into the long hallway. Frowning, she walked over to the beginning of the hallway, blinking in shock when all she saw was an endless corridor. She went to take a step away but stopped in her tracks, frozen in horror.

Terrified screams had suddenly replaced the laughter and singing, sending terror flooding through her body. Mai stood there petrified, cold sweat dotting her forehead and her heart to pound painfully in her chest. Fear coiled into the very pit of her stomach, and her Sense came back with a vengeance, urging her to wake up and leave the dream world.

Panic clouded her mind, but a small voice that she recognised as Naru sneered in her head. '_It's only a dream, Mai. Nothing can hurt you in a dream._' She nodded her head minutely, chanting the mantra that Monk had taught her years ago under her breath. It might not do much in a dream, but it was a small measure of comfort as fear had always been a large factor in her dreams.

Almost as suddenly as the sound had started, the screams stopped, leaving in its place an eerie silence that clawed at her gut. She stood frozen by her place in front of the corridor, the atmosphere feeling so out of place with the sunny and bright room around her. The breath in her lungs felt frozen and heavy, but she dared not move, fear and dread boiling through her veins.

The sound of nails scraping down a chalk board had her bolting down the corridor like a startled animal. A whimper left her mouth as she rocketed into the gloom, vague flashes of memory rising to the surface of her mind, but she viciously blocked them, the terror of things long forgotten forcing her to keep them buried. The sound echoed behind her, although it seemed to be getting weaker the further away she got; still she pumped her legs, the hallway stretching on and on, and ending far away in the distance in a cluster of shadows.

Gone was the sunny yellow paint; the world warping around her into a twisted caricature of what she had seen before. Grey-black paint peeled and flaked in large sections along the wall as the light fixtures above her head flickered morbidly. The further she ran down the hall, the more sinister it became around her. Long, jagged marks in the wall became apparent as the paint completely disappeared, revealing sheet metal and the linoleum flooring becoming concrete beneath her feet. More and more of the thin marks became apparent, coming in sets of three's, then fours, and finally sets five that had Mai's stomach bottoming out and her blood run cold.

The fluorescent lights above her kept flickering spasmodically, only adding fuel to her fear-induced run. She couldn't hear the nails tapping anymore, the only sound echoing around her now being that of her bare feet slapping hard against the concrete and her harsh breathing. As she continued, she started to notice something else.

Little splotches had appeared at intermittent intervals on the floor and along the walls. Her mind was screaming at her not to analyse what she was seeing, that what she needed to focus on was finding a way out, but the logical _Naru_-esq part of her mind was admitting that yes, it looked like blood.

A shiver crawled down her spine, and almost as if by mentally acknowledging it, large puddles started to riddle the hallway until she was slipping and sliding in the crimson pools that had suddenly stained the floor and ceiling. Almost as suddenly as the appearance of the blood-coated hallway, a set of dark, paint-peeling double-doors seemed to materialize from the darkness in front of her and she crashed through them.

A terrified scream came out of her throat as she lost her balance and slammed hard into the floor, sliding along on her belly before coming to a stop against a wall. Panting heavily, she tried not to panic as she felt warm liquid seeping into her clothes and matted into her hair. Whimpering, she struggled to her knees, staring in wide-eyed horror as the blood coated her entire body in red. Before she could stop it, another scream bubbled up in her throat, the sound echoing around her in the gloom of the room.

Her eyes frantically searched for an exit in the room, the fear and panic starting to jumble her thoughts. She was no longer envisioning this as a dream; it didn't feel like one anymore. She felt as she was living a nightmare, feeling things that she had never wanted to feel anymore, and she was getting _reality confused with dream_. A terrified part of her mind, some little voice that she thought she had gotten rid of years ago, was screaming that it was all real, _and that he was finally going to make real with his threat_.

The sudden roll of her stomach got her snap back to reality (_it's just a __**dream!**__ Get over it Mai_! Snapped that Naru-like voice in her head_)_ and she heaved the contents of her stomach into the puddle of blood on the floor. Tears seeped from under her eyes, mingling with the drying blood and cold sweat on her face. Leaning back on her knees, she closed her eyes and panted heavily, trying to regain the breath that she had lost.

Her legs and sides hurt from pushing herself so hard, as did the cuts on her feet. She felt sick and nauseous from seeing some of the things that she had seen, but most of all she was confused. That tiny, terrified voice that had been screaming in her head before had seemed to vanish to some long-lost part of her brain, dragging with it the secrets of what she could undeniably say was her past. What had it been saying? He was finally going to make real on his threat?

Before she could really contemplate any more of what was going on around her, the jangling of chains had her jumping to her feet, pressing her back against the cold wall as a small measure of protection.

The noise continued before stopping, the silence left in its wake almost deafening.

"W-w-who's there?" she whispered, her cinnamon eyes darting around in the gloom. She held her breath, heart pounding frantically as her ears strained to hear any kind of noise.

Her answer came in the form of a loud bang sounding from up above her and the noisy rattle of chains being let loose. Snapping her head to look above her, she screamed and dove to the side, narrowly missing being crushed by body wrapped up in crimson-coated chains. Landing once again on the bloody floor, Mai whimpered and scuttled away, watching wide-eyed as the body that had nearly crushed her was joined by more and more bodies until she counted eight in total. The each landed with a sickening crunch followed by a splash, and it wasn't until the last body fell that the sobs Mai had been holding were released.

Chihiro's life-less eyes stared at her, her body slowly slithering down the pile of dead carcasses until it rested at an unnatural angle on its back. From where Mai sat, she could clearly see how she had been murdered, her dream springing to the forefront of her mind.

_Wicked-long claws sliced into flesh, cleaving her chest open repeatedly. Her screams had turned to gurgles as her murderer slashed at her throat and laughed wickedly. Blood arched into the air, coating everything in glorious red before hunks of flesh were hacked away from her still-living body. He wouldn't allow her to die, no, not yet. He still had so much pain to inflict, so much horror to carve into her very soul._

She couldn't help but gag as she remembered the dream, seeing the after-math of her best-friends body first-hand. Chihiro's entire chest had been carved out, leaving nothing but the back of her rib-cage and her spin intact. All of her major organs had been torn to shreds, the only thing remaining was her heart which was still attached to some flesh and hung morbidly by her head.

Bile threatened to make her sick again, but Mai swallowed it back down. She refused to be weak again. She was sick of feeling this way.

Standing up on unsteady feet, she breathed through her mouth, gagging at how metallic the air tasted. The smell of decay started to curl up her nostrils, but once again she refused to back down. "I will find who did this to you, Chihiro, I swear it." She vowed to herself, screaming in fear when the floor seemed to suddenly disappear under her feet.

"_You need to find me first_." A sinister voice cackled as her world faded to black.

**x**

**x**

**x**

The front door to SPR opened with a harsher _bang_ than usual. Mai stalked in, dumping her bag at her desk and all but ripping her coat off. Ignoring Naru's yell for tea, she stormed into the kitchenette and started banging around, searching the coffee beans that she needed to function for the day.

Her dream from the night before had left her anxious and edgy, not to mention highly confused. She could barely remember bits and pieces of it, only that she had stood in the middle of a day care lobby and that Chihiro had been involved somehow.

Running a hand through her hair in frustration, she gave a grunt of satisfaction when she found what she was looking for and filled the tea pot with water to boil. She leant against the counter as she waited, feeling so many emotions that she was surprised that only thing she had done was scream at a man who had cut in front of her at the ticket line for the bus.

Looking up and out of the window into the cold, grey day, she let her mind wander, trying to sort out the jumble that was her thoughts. The dream had left her upset, as she knew that it was one of _those_ dreams, but she could hardly remember what it had been about. That had never happened before. Since she had been training with Lin and sometimes even Naru, she had learnt to tell the different between a regular dream and one of _those_ dreams.

Naru had called them_ post-cognitive_, Mai just called them a pain in the ass.

It had been two days since the funeral, and ever since that day, Mai had been spending every spare hour researching her past and that of Chihiro's. So far she had had no luck, other than her father had been a decorated officer in the force, and that Chihiro's grandfather had own a reputable vineyard in Ireland. Other than that, she couldn't find the connection between them, or even something to suggest that they had known each other as children.

"I said tea, Mai."

Jumping in shock, Mai whirled around, belated realising that the tea pot had started to whistle. Frowning in thought, she moved the pot to sit on the counter and opened the cupboard above to retrieve a mug and a tea-cup. She ignored the presence of her boss, opting to keep her hands busy while her mind tried to find some semblance of order.

"I am sorry, you know."

That jolt Mai from her musing. She spun to look at him, blinking wide eyes at his stoic figure. "Um, thank you?" she said uncertainly, continuing with the task of preparing her black coffee and his Earl Gray tea. She kept one eye locked on him, uncertain as to how to continue with that line of conversation.

Sighing in frustration, Naru ran a hand through his hair and took the tea cup that she offered him. He was angry at himself for not saying anything to her earlier, but he had absolutely no idea how to comfort the one girl that got under his skin from something as hideous as murder. He opened his mouth to saying something else, when the front door opened once again. Cursing softly (and ignoring the quiet giggle from Mai), he put the tea cup down on the counter and walked out into the waiting room.

He stopped dead when he saw just who had walked through the front door.

**x**

**x**

**x**

**A/N:** Let me just say that this chapter was a _bitch_ to write. It just wouldn't do as it was told... That and I had a particularly funny moment while typing it. I'm a person who generally likes to listen to music why writing, but for this chapter, I needed silence (this has never happened before, ever). So, as I'm typing the scene where the screams stop and the nails-on-the-chalk-board start, my stomach gave this weird noise that sounded like _nails on a freaking chalk-board_! Scared the bee-jeebus out of myself that I had to take a break for a while.

Anyway, I hope you've all enjoyed this chapter, and hopefully the next chapter should be up in the next two weeks (if work permits me).

Reviews feed me!


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